Borusan advances AI from a technological tool to an organizational culture

In the latest episode of Geleceğe İlham Buluşmaları, Borusan Holding focuses on artificial intelligence (AI). Deniz Emre Dağ, Deputy General Manager of Strategy and Business Development at Borusan Group, emphasized a human-centric digital transformation approach, noting that the goal is to enable employees to become individuals who can create their own digital solutions. Levent Özbilgin, General Manager of Microsoft Türkiye, described AI as “the electricity of the new century”, underlining their ambition to make this technology an easy-to-use, widely accessible standard.

In line with Borusan Holding’s focus areas of climate, people, and innovation, the new episode of the Geleceğe İlham Buluşmaları video series examines AI—one of today’s most prominent topics. Moderated by Barış Doğru, Editor-in-Chief of EkoIQ, the discussion brings together Deniz Emre Dağ and Levent Özbilgin to explore the transformative power, strategic importance, and future of AI in the corporate world.

Borusan’s strategic approach: Customer, operations, and people at the center

Deniz Emre Dağ highlighted that Borusan approaches its AI journey with a strategic lens tailored to each Group company, aiming to generate tangible value through AI. He noted that Borusan’s AI strategy and transformation efforts are shaped around three core objectives:

• Growth: Delivering a personalized, AI-driven customer experience and accelerating growth by reaching the right customer at the right time with the right offer.
• Efficiency: Increasing predictability and reducing losses across supply chain and production through end-to-end AI-optimized processes, extending asset lifecycles, and establishing decision mechanisms that combine human intuition with AI insights for better decision-making.
• AI for everyone: Building a democratic technology culture in which employees can develop their own digital solutions.

Emphasizing that roles within jobs and processes will evolve alongside this transformation, Dağ said:
“If we invest one unit in technology, we know we need to invest five or six times more in other dimensions—talent, ecosystem, and communication. With the democratization of technology, employees no longer need to wait for digital solutions from their IT departments. They will become ‘super employees’ who can develop their own solutions using AI tools and quickly integrate them into their work.”

Artificial intelligence: The electricity of the new century

Levent Özbilgin drew parallels between Microsoft’s founding vision and its AI strategy, describing AI as a turning point comparable to the invention of electricity.
“We truly compare AI to electricity. We believe it will create a disruption of a similar magnitude—fundamentally changing how we work and how we live. We have moved beyond data and information; information alone is no longer enough. We need intelligence that can use information and generate added value,” he said.

Özbilgin added that, as a platform company, Microsoft aims to scale the adoption of AI and provide an accessible, standardized infrastructure for everyone. Looking ahead, he noted that hundreds of thousands of AI “agents” will be integrated into business processes. He also shared that Microsoft applies a “Customer Zero” approach internally—producing 38% of its software code with AI and actively using the technology in sales forecasting and customer service operations.

An “AI Faculty” for Borusan employees

Highlighting the importance Borusan places on talent alongside technology investments, Deniz Emre Dağ announced the launch of an “AI Faculty” within Borusan Academy. Set to begin in 2026, the initiative aims to develop AI capabilities across the entire organization—from senior leadership to field employees and technical roles—helping all Group employees advance to the next level with AI. The faculty will offer specialized training modules across different categories.

The AI era across Borusan’s industries

Sharing concrete use cases from within the Group, Dağ pointed to AI-powered applications at Borusan Next, the Group’s second-hand vehicle trading platform, as well as projects designed to boost production efficiency in the energy sector.

In the latest episode of Geleceğe İlham Buluşmaları, both speakers agreed that AI transformation is not merely a technological shift, but also a cultural adaptation process that encompasses change and continuous development.

The new episode of Geleceğe İlham Buluşmaları is available on Borusan Holding’s YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0OM95r4jGKI